Ludwig Weber (pilot)

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Ludwig Weber (born October 31, 1895 in Freiburg im Breisgau ; † 1991 in Beinwil am See , Switzerland ) was a German pilot and designer of cars, motorcycles and airplanes. He was a fighter pilot in World War I , engineer and pilot at the Junkers company , personal pilot of the Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia , flight instructor for the Portuguese Air Force and head of the Brazilian transport company Viação Aérea São Paulo (VASP). He was the flight instructor of Hermann Frommherz and Hermann Göring and built the first airplane in Ethiopia.

Ludwig Weber built cars and motorcycles in Freiburg im Breisgau from 1920–1928. The vehicles were named LuWe , with the main focus being on the motorcycles sector, as Ludwig was almost ruined with the automobiles. The motorcycles were built under license by various people and companies until 1933.

career

Ludwig Weber was a fighter pilot in Jagdstaffel 3 (Jasta 3) from November 1916 to November 1917 and flew an Albatros D.II , Albatros DV , etc. He was shot down once and served briefly as a flight instructor in Jagdstaffelschule I from November 17, 1917 . In the combat single- seat squadron 4b ( Kest 4b ), deployed as home security squadron in Freiburg im Breisgau , he experienced the end of the war.

From 1925 to 1928 he was the pilot of a Dietrich Gobiet aircraft in Freiburg , among other things he was also the chief pilot of the Luftverker-Gesellschaft Schwarzwald. On June 1, 1928 he was appointed engineer and pilot by the Junkers company.

In 1933 he went to Addis Ababa on behalf of the company to repair a JU W33 C that had crashed . The Emperor Haile Selassie offered him the post of private pilot and designer to establish aviation in Ethiopia with his own Ethiopian aircraft. He built the airplane AETHIOPIEN I according to his own plans (he used parts of a Meindl van Nes A VII (M7) for a completely new design) and flew it for the first time in 1935. This airplane was shipped in parts to Addis Ababa and there by Ludwig Weber modified and assembled. Two more aircraft were planned, but the Italian invasion in October 1935 meant the end of the cooperation. Weber and his crew fled the advancing Italian troops in 1936 with the JU W 33 C, which was repaired in 1933 .

In the same year Weber went to Portugal to train the local air force on the Junkers Ju 52 / 3m aircraft and later on the Junkers Ju 86 . In the spring of 1939 he became head of the newly founded Brazilian transport company Viação Aérea São Paulo (VASP). In Brazil, presumably in 1943, he married the Swiss Frieda Heuri, whom he had previously met in Portugal. He ended his active pilot career in São Paulo in 1949 .

The Weber-Heuri couple had lived in Beinwil am See in Switzerland since 1967, where Weber died in 1991. The gravestone on his urn grave bears the inscription: Ludwig Weber-Heuri, 1895–1991. Underneath the logo 'Alter Adler'.

literature

personal data
SURNAME Weber, Ludwig
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Weber, Ludwig Mathias; Luwe
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German pilot, engineer, designer; Pioneer in car, motorcycle and aircraft construction
DATE OF BIRTH October 31, 1895
PLACE OF BIRTH Freiburg in Breisgau
DATE OF DEATH 1991
Place of death Beinwil am See , Switzerland